43 per cent turnout to vote at Dusu polls

Students stand in a queue to cast their votes during Delhi University Students’ Union polls at North Campus. (Photo: Bunny Smith)

New Delhi: The voting percentage for this year’s Delhi University Students’ Union (Dusu) elections was 43.8 per cent, similar to last year’s turnout.

The polling on Wednesday, which began at 8:30 am and continued till 7:30 pm, took place at 52 centres in the DU colleges to decide the fate of 23 candidates. Only five of the 23 candidates were women.

Among the major organisations contesting Delhi University Students’ Union (Dusu) election 2018 are National Students’ Union of India (NSUI) — the student wing of the Congress party, Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) — affiliated with the BJP, Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) Chhatra Yuva Sangharsh Samiti and Students Federation of India (SFI) — the student wing of the Communist Party of India (Marxist).

The NSUI has promised to get the “Institute of Eminence” tag for Delhi University and start food platters for `10 in colleges. The ABVP has promised to spend 50 per cent of the student union’s budget on women and social-justice related activities, including installing sanitary pad vending machines in college campuses. The CYSS has promised to ensure installation of CCTV cameras, set up of police booths on campus and ending the “culture of hooliganism” if it were to be elected.

There are five candidates each contesting for the post of the president and the vice president of Dusu. While the ABVP has fielded Ankiv Baisoya for the post of the president, the NSUI and CYSS-AISA alliance nominated Sunny Chillar and Abhigyan respectively.

After the AAP came to power in Delhi in February 2015, its students wing had unsuccessfully contested Dusu polls. It has promised to ensure installation of CCTV cameras, setting up of police booths on campus, ending the “culture of hooliganism” and opposition to “commercialisation of education”.

The results will be announced on Thursday. Heavy police security was observed in the area, with about 700 police personnel deployed in North Campus.

A person wearing a question mark sign was detained by the police outside Ramjas College. Senior faculty members were posted as observers at the centres and around 700 electronic voting machines (EVMs) have been installed.